I would like to install gentoox on my xbox but cannot justify giving up so much hard drive space to something that I will only use to browse the web occasionally & check emails.

I have Mepis linux installed on my main PC so you can see I don't need a full distro on the xbox.

Is it possible to have a basic distro with xfce desktop and just a few apps like firefox & thunderbird with all the necessary plugins & codecs like flash, Java, realplayer, mplayer & mplayer plugin, win32 codecs etc & anything needed for installing extra software from portage. Anyone can always add more software as they need it. I just want something that boots quickly and takes a minimum of space.

Now don't get me wrong I've tried many versions of xbox linux and have come to end up using gentoox, but that is because it is right for me. It sounds however like you might be more suited to be using X-DSLhttp://www.xbox-linux.org/wiki/Download#X-DSL

I prefer having a distro with the XFCE desktop & XDSL uses Fluxbox for its desktop. I am looking at sXb though because it is slackware based like Zenwalk so I might be able to build a slimmed down Zenwalk using parts of sXb.
I currently have Xebian on my xbox which I installed the XFCE desktop onto, but its not as i'd like it. I still prefer Gentoox but its just the size of it that deters me from putting it on my xbox.
Hopefully, if they get linux running on the Xbox 360, I will put gentoox on that.